Research On Reflective Teaching And Professional Development Of College English Teachers

With the deepening of the College English education reform, thedemands on professional development of College English teachers arebecoming increasingly high. However, the traditional "up-down" model ofteacher professional development cannot satisfy the need of teacherprofessional development. In the 1980s, a completely new model,"bottom-up" model, appeared in the teacher education field of such westerncountries as America and Britain, which has attracted many teacher educationresearchers into this field. This "bottom-up" model holds that a teacher shouldtake the Self as an important source in her/his professional development byreflecting upon her/his own teaching practice. How to do reflective teaching tofacilitate professional development has ever since become a very importantissue in the teacher education research field of the world.However, in the teacher education field of our country, such research israre and just belongs to an initial stage. Guided by Piaget and Vyggosky'sconstructive theory and Roger's humanistic theory, the writer attempts toexplore an effective way for College English teachers to promote theirprofessional development by inviting College English teachers to participatein the research and investigating the general situation of their professionaldevelopment as well as their reflective teaching practice. First differentdefinitions of teacher professional development and reflective teaching areanalyzed, and then the relationships between them and techniques and strategies of reflective teaching are discussed. The writer points out thatreflective teaching is an effective way for teacher professional development.In order to know the situation of reflective teaching practiced among collegeEnglish teachers in our country and the effects of reflective teaching in theirprofessional development, the writer investigates 180 College Englishteachers from Hunan province mainly through a questionnaire. Well-informedby the questionnaire survey, the writer conducts in-depth interviews with fourCollege English teachers from the subjects in the questionnaire who havebetter performance in reflective teaching. After interviewing them, the writerhas chosen one from the four as the subject of case study.This study reveals that the situation of reflective teaching practiced amongCollege English teachers is not satisfying. More than 70% College Englishteachers have not systematically practiced reflective teaching, and less than30% of them have systematically reflected upon their teaching, while theCollege English teachers whose profession has been improved are those whohave systematically done reflective teaching. This shows that reflectiveteaching is an effective way for teacher professional development though themajority of them fail to do so in a systematic way. Meanwhile, the case studyhas provided a persuasive example to illustrate that reflective teaching isreally an effective way for professional development of College Englishteachers.The findings of this study are significant and inductive to teacher professional development. Based on the major findings of the study, somesuggestions are offered not only for teachers but also for teacher educationadministrators and teacher education researchers.